Who and what is AfriForum?

AfriForum is an Afrikaans civil rights organisation that protects the rights of minority groups at national as well as provincial level, and anyone who can identify with AfriForum’s principles and objectives may join the organisation. AfriForum’s community plan focuses on mobilising communities to thus take control of their own streets and neighbourhoods again. AfriForum ensures that your constitutional and civil rights are recognised and protected at national level.

Wie en wat is AfriForum?

AfriForum is ’n Afrikaanse burgerregteorganisasie wat die regte van minderheidsgroepe op sowel nasionale as provinsiale vlak beskerm, en enigiemand wat met AfriForum se beginsels en doelstellings kan identifiseer, mag by die organisasie aansluit. AfriForum se gemeenskapsplan fokus daarop om gemeenskappe te mobiliseer om só weer beheer terug te neem oor hul eie strate en woonbuurtes. AfriForum verseker dat jou grondwetlike én burgerregte op nasionale vlak erken en beskerm word.

Stop Cuba donation

Stop Cuba donation
The economic assistance package
Process

The relationship between the Cuban government and the South African ANC-controlled government boils down to a bottomless dumping site for tax money. The ANC government makes decisions that benefit its political agenda and relationships, but that do not have the best interests of South Africa or its citizens at heart.

On 25 October 2023 AfriForum won a court case against the government, although the Department of International Relations and Cooperation had fought tooth and nail in an effort to continue with its R50 million donation to its Cuban friends. AfriForum did not stop there, however. On 18 October 2018 the civil rights organisation directed an application in terms of the Promotion of Access to Information Act 2 of 2002 (better known as a PAIA application) to the Department. In this application we demanded the Department to share information on all donations that had been made to Cuba over the previous 20 years. It was already known in 2016 that South Africa and Cube had signed more than 30 bilateral agreements that comprise large areas of cooperation, including education, science and technology, agriculture, health services, housing, and water and sanitation.

The Department has acknowledged in 2016 already that the cooperation between South Africa and Cuba is highest in the areas of health, human settlements and public works. Cooperation includes technical support on various terrains, including health, engineering and education. The South African-Cuban medical exchange programme was established in the early 1990s and is regarded as the most important proof of cooperation between these two countries. The agreement was entered into to address the serious shortage of healthcare practitioners in South Africa’s rural and underserviced urban areas. In the meantime, Cuban doctors in South Africa receive the little money that the health department has available for salaries, while South African doctors must be happy with the minimum.

The economic assistance package

In 2012 South Africa signed an agreement with Cuba for an economic assistance package for a total amount of R350 million. This agreement was finalised on 25 November 2011 and signed on 3 February 2012. This was not a loan that Cuba had to pay back – rather, it was a form of economic relief after hurricane Ike had devastated the country. Donations were made in three separate “facilities”:

Facility A (2 October 2015) – this is a grant of R40 million for the purchase of seed, of which seed to the value of R5 million had to be purchased from South Africa, while the remaining R35 million had to be purchased from either South Africa or somewhere else.
Facility B (18 August 2011) – this is a solidarity grant of R100 million to purchase goods from the South African market.
Facility C (4 December 2018) – this is a R210 million credit line. This credit line refers to an amount of money that Cuba could borrow from South Africa in the form of an economic assistance package.

The information that the Department provided to AfriForum after the PAIA application did not include any contracts, documents, separate papers or book marks, however. The Department insists that AfriForum can have access to these documents through an internal appeal, thereby refusing to share any exhibits. What is the ANC government trying to hide?